Internet Trends in 2007-What You Must Be Aware Of

Before we completely move to what 2007 brings, there are some worthwhile things to remember this 2006.

One of the most prominent has to do with the world's biggest search engine, none other than Google. In 2006 Google started to put more weight on the use of Latent Semantic Indexing technology, or LSI, for short.

The use of this technology seeks to lessen the incidence of ranking manipulation in the search engine results. Over and above this, however, is the intent of returning more relevant sites and results for a query sent out, eliminating much of the "useless weeds" that clutter the internet.

In very simple terms, latent semantic indexing tells a search engine (in this case Google) just what a page is all about. This now goes beyond simply matching search query text, or text typed in by web searchers looking for information or products. The model is far more complicated and "smarter" than any indexing technology used before.

How to circumvent LSI? Is this even possible? If you want to rank well in the search engines (for targeted, free web traffic) there's no shortcut for sure, except writing and putting high quality content on your website with real value for the website visitors you're targeting.

Writing or providing more in-depth content and information necessarily means that you put in all the related words for that topic in proper context, less in a manipulative way. Alternatively, when using links back to your site from other articles or other link sources, vary your anchor text (the actual text you use to hyperlink back to your site).

For a website on seo, for example, mix the anchor text using different words such as seo, search engine optimization, search engine, search engines (pl.), search engine tips and techniques, etc.

Consistently updating your content and continually refining it also has the added benefit of getting your site frequently indexed by the search engines; if your content is also original enough, you avoid penalties of duplicate content.

Search engine algorithms nothwitstanding, though, now it's time to mention a trend that's slowly becoming more pronounced and which is sure to be a big influence to the world at large in the coming months (maybe years), and that is social networking sites.

This was actually borne out of the content provided in these sites, and revolved around information that was always accessible and new: information (such as video) and varying interests of its members.

The aim is to bring together internet surfers and visitors towards sharing info (or content) about themselves and their interests. Undoubtedly, if the number of subscribers or members alone are to be the basis, these networking sites are quite popular, especially with the younger market.

MySpace, for example, has become the virtual online equivalent of "hanging out" at a mall for most teens, all 60-70 million of them. With MySpace you can provide your own content by uploading music, information and news about yourself using your profile.

Other popular social networking sites include Facebook (targeted at college students)Xanga (a blog community site), LinkedIn (for professionals) and most recently (October 2006) YouTube, a site where you can upload personal (or whatever else) video.

Just what type of perceived worth can you attach to some of these companies? Well let's let the dollar figures speak for themselves: in 2005 Rupert Murdoch of News Corp. paid $580 million to MySpace as part of a $1.3Billion internet acquisition scheme (it now becomes part of Fox Interactive Media).

And in October of 2006 Google paid a whopping $1.65 Billion to acquire YouTube, the most expensive purchase it has made in the last eight years.

Large figures, definitely geared towards giving advertisers a new playground to extend their ads on and promote their products with. Especially since the internet is rapidly replacing viewing time from television these days as part of most people's changing lifestyles.

If you're an online businessman, what's important now is for you to familiarize yourself with these networking sites since some of them (such as YouTube) can become an avenue for you to extend your internet marketing to should you have a product or service you want advertised.

Some seminars or do-it-yourself videos can be easily uploaded online using YouTube), which if used creatively can definitely expand your prospect or customer base online. Many are discovering that Video is fast becoming a good medium for teaching, so take your cue from there.

After all, social networking is about developing your own group using commonalities you have. There's no reason why you shouldn't use it to your advantage.

Winston Yam is an internet marketer, owner and webmaster of http://www.1st-in-online-income.com, a site offering information on internet marketing and website promotion advice, tips, tools, resources and profitles of internet experts. The site offers no-nonsense information and product recommendations on how to make a legitimate living online.